Happy Sunday All!

It's gonna be blistery hot and humid here in EL. Great day for Air Conditioning.

I hope all of you great MICHIGAN fans have a fabulous day today!

LET'S GO BLUE!!!!!

71 and sunny here in San Diego. Nothing new. Perfect day for a hike.

In August I'm going to hike the John Muir Trail (JMT). If you've never heard of it you absolutely have to google it. The trail, including the added Half Dome hike and the hike down from Mt Whitney is 223 miles long. My plan is to finish it in 14 days. I've done it before (18 days  in 2007) but I have acquired some new, lighter (hopefully better) gear so I'm gonna go hike 8 miles today and test out some of that gear and get a feel for my pack weight. This will be the first of two pre-trip test hikes. Next weekend I'm going to hike 40 miles from Campo to Mt Laguna on the Pacific Crest Trail (PCT).

Now that sounds like fun. All except the walking part! lol

Warm/hot here in Chicago. 

Anything over 75 is hot to me. 

Nice visit to Wrigley Field yesterday. Obviously made the smart decision to leave in the middle of the 8th before the Cubs could lose (which, of course, they did.) I've honestly mastered days at Wrigley. 

Go Hawks. 

Have a great day, folks.

sandyeggo_blue, come on that's easy, when you cross the Grand Canyon on a wire without a safety tether, then I'll be impressed, haha

Seriously, that sounds awesome!! Took your suggestion and googled. Incredible scenery, breath taking views, I'm jealous! I see there is Vermillion View cabins to pick up supplies, food, resort to rest. Are there other camp areas to replenish supplies or do you pack a lot food, water?

Have hiked Grand Tetons, took tram car to top of mountain, hiked for about 10 miles, incredible views peace and quiet. Hiked around Yellowstone as well, but just short 1/2 day and full day hikes. But I'm not worthy as you, I like my nice bed and warm shower at night! Enjoy, have fun, be safe, I'm sure you will & I presume proudly wearing M gear!

booboo wrote:

sandyeggo_blue, come on that's easy, when you cross the Grand Canyon on a wire without a safety tether, then I'll be impressed, haha

Seriously, that sounds awesome!! Took your suggestion and googled. Incredible scenery, breath taking views, I'm jealous! I see there is Vermillion View cabins to pick up supplies, food, resort to rest. Are there other camp areas to replenish supplies or do you pack a lot food, water?

Have hiked Grand Tetons, took tram car to top of mountain, hiked for about 10 miles, incredible views peace and quiet. Hiked around Yellowstone as well, but just short 1/2 day and full day hikes. But I'm not worthy as you, I like my nice bed and warm shower at night! Enjoy, have fun, be safe, I'm sure you will & I presume proudly wearing M gear!

booboo there are several spots to resupply along the trail. The most common are Tuolumne, Mammoth/Reds, Vermillion Valley, Muir Ranch and Kearsarge. Plus you can always send packages in advance to the many ranger stations but those are hit and miss since the rangers are usually out in the back country and away from their cabins/stations for days at a time.

You can basically free camp anywhere you find a spot. There are really only a few places along the entire 220+ miles that there is an actual campsite. So lets say weather delayed you or you just didn't feel like going any further for the day, you can stop well short of your intended destination and set up a tent. Also, if you make  your miles and feel like going on you can do that as well. You aren't held to a certain spot or destination.

Luckily the water is really the easiest part. There are lakes and streams along the entire route. I think the longest distance between water is a few miles at most (at least until the Whitney climb). You just have to be sure to bring a water purifying system. I just bought and tested a gravity works 2.0 filter system. It worked great on my hike yesterday. I'll get a bit more use out of it when I hike 40 miles next Friday and Saturday.

When I did the hike in '07 we resupplied in 3 spots. We had a lot more time to hike the trail and I didn't feel like carrying the extra weight so we decided to carry less and resupply more. This time around I'm doing it in 14 days or under. So basically I'm only going to resupply once at Red's Meadows in Mammoth. I will plan on carrying 8 days of food with me to start and then resupply with 8 more days. I'll have to send my resupply in advance though to make sure it's there when I get there to pick it up.

I have been looking forward to this hike for a while now. Permits go up for grabs (first call first serve) exactly 6 months in advance of your start date so you have to be on the ball and plan ahead. This is definitely not a trip you just decide to do on the fly because permits will not be available. I actually wanted to start on 8/10 but two days in a row I called in and didn't get a permit. I finally got one for 8/12 so I'll start then. I plan on climbing Half Dome also and got a permit for that as well.

I will be taking a lot of pictures this time around because I plan on putting together a video or a blog or something to share.

Of course I'll be sporting some M gear. At the very least I'll have my beanie at camp and as is custom, hikers put patches on their packs, and I will have a San Diego patch and a Michigan patch on mine. Maybe I'll bring my Block M flag to fly outside of my tent. It's a 20x30 so it should work fine.